


Blue Is The Darkest Color

by hakuraimaru



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: (kind of!!), Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Canon Compliant, M/M, Miyazaki AU, Unrequited Love, now with art!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-24
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-05-15 22:33:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5802757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hakuraimaru/pseuds/hakuraimaru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kageyama doesn't mean to confess, but the words let themselves out anyway. Soon, he finds himself and Iwaizumi running for their lives under the light of the harvest moon, stumbling into the sewer-bound domain of a terrifying god. In the end, Kageyama knows they'll be alright – the journey is there only to help him believe it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blue Is The Darkest Color

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Build A Temple In Me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3716002) by [Authoress](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Authoress/pseuds/Authoress). 



“ _Kageyama!”_

Kageyama glanced back, feeling the tremble of footsteps as the older boy caught up with him.

“Iwaizumi-san,” Kageyama greeted simply.

“Hey. Sorry about,” Iwaizumi sucked in air, motioning to the gym, “all that. He’s stressed, is all.”

“O-oh. Okay.”

“Yeah. Sorry,” Iwaizumi repeated. He seemed concerned. “You alright, Kageyama?”

“...yeah.”

The incident in the gym had startled Kageyama, of course; it was very unlike Oikawa to lose his composure, especially in front of the first year he had worked so hard to passively antagonize for so long. There had been something very dangerous in his eyes. Kageyama was almost certain that his fellow setter would have hit him, had Iwaizumi not been there.

But the incident hadn’t scared Kageyama. Iwaizumi _had_ been there.

“Are you headed home?” Iwaizumi asked.

“Yeah. I was just leaving.”

“Great,” Iwaizumi said, adjusting the straps on his bag. “Let’s walk together.”

Kageyama felt something tugging at him as they walked in step, the gym sinking out of view as the rising tops of restaurants and drugstores swallowed Kitagawa Daiichi. Conversation was never easier than this, a simple _one-two_ to the tempo of their feet.

“The coach always had me practice alone,” Kageyama explained. “He wanted to make sure the others didn’t hold back my potential.”

“Man, who cares about ‘potential’ in elementary school?” Iwaizumi scoffed. “My coach never would have let us out of sight. She made us teach the other kids.”

“That sucks.”

“Not really.” Kageyama glanced over curiously, but Iwaizumi’s attention was focused elsewhere. “Y’know, I always liked helping out the younger kids. You never know where the next great player will come from.”

“...mmh,” Kageyama grunted. Iwaizumi laughed.

“We can’t all be geniuses like you,” he said, clapping Kageyama on the back.

As his blood rose and burned in his cheeks, Kageyama realized that this was the _do-or-die_ moment, and the words untied themselves and ran wild.

“Iwaizumi-san!” he shouted, stopping short. His senpai paused, turning to face him, and was visibly taken aback as Kageyama bowed stiffly and abruptly. “I have to tell you something!”

He could feel Iwaizumi regarding him. “Okay.”

Kageyama took a breath, inevitability hanging over him like an ax. Then, his mouth forced itself into motion.

“...I like you!...I really like you, Iwaizumi-san,” he admitted, scrunching his eyes shut as the words crossed into the open, as he slowly felt reality seep into his bones, the words and their finality pulling him down like anchors. “I always have.”

“Kageyama…”

Kageyama chanced a look, glancing up at the stunned expression on Iwaizumi’s face. _It must have never occurred to him,_ Kageyama realized, and wasn’t sure whether or not that was a good thing. He wondered if he was supposed to say, _“You don’t have to answer right now,”_ or something like that, but he didn’t think he could get the words out right, even if he knew what to say.

Finally, Iwaizumi sighed. “Listen.”

Kageyama looked back at his feet, feeling that he already had his answer – and he wondered:  _is this what organ failure feels like? –_  but the end of the sentence never came. His skin was chilled, and he felt like the color was being slowly drained, sucked out through the soles of his sneakers.

“...shit!” Kageyama flinched – Iwaizumi cussed all the time, but never at him – but the older boy was looking up, he saw, jawline stiff with fear as he studied the sky. Kageyama followed his gaze, and saw: the moon was _huge_ , a mammoth red-yellow eye, choking every star out of the celestial haze.

“We have to go!” Iwaizumi yelled. “Kageyama!” The younger boy couldn’t seem to make his feet move until he felt himself pulled into a sprint by the hand – and then they burst into a full-out run, heavy-footed and desperate, though Kageyama had no idea what they were running _from_ – he couldn’t hear anything behind them, nothing but the steady throbbing of their footsteps.

“Iwaizumi-san!” Kageyama managed between gasps of air.

“It’s,” Iwaizumi panted, “the harvest moon” – _breath –_ “we have to hurry” – _breath_ – “our shadows…”

“What?”

“We have to find somewhere dark!” Iwaizumi pulled ahead, dragging Kageyama more insistently. “Our shadows will get reaped!”

“Reaped?” Kageyama echoed, but he somehow understood what Iwaizumi meant. It was that feeling – the sense that there’s that tiny gap of time between what you think and what you do, a chasm that cracks and grows to an omnivorous jaw, sucking away as you feel yourself falling _further and further away from your body, one second, two seconds behind, until you’re an outline being pulled out of time altogether…_

 

_“...Kageyama..._ Kageyama!” Kageyama came to himself again, feeling himself shaking, then _being_ shaken, as he took in Iwaizumi’s tense face right in front of his, which sank from panic to relief. “Almost lost you.” Kageyama wasn’t sure how he was standing, or where they were, exactly – they must have been running all this time.

“What…?”

“Lucky I looked back,” Iwaizumi said. “Your shadow was, like, three feet behind you! It could have been ripped away altogether, and then...!”

Kageyama stared down at his hands, studying the faint trembling of his fingers – which was odd, because they didn’t feel like they were moving at all – until his vision came into fuller focus and he realized that it was only the lines of the shadows that were moving, pulling backwards, trying to unhook themselves from his skin…

They had stopped at an open intersection, Kageyama noticed. Nothing was moving. There was something unfinished about the scene – some crucial step had been misplaced, leaving a distinctly artificial feeling. The lamps didn’t shine right, light oozing out at no particular angle, like white noise filling a soundscape.

He jolted at the sound of banging – it was Iwaizumi, who’d run ahead and was pounding on the only windowless building, screaming inaudibly. Kageyama knew that he should hope for the door to open but, somehow, he knew already that it was a lost cause. _But if not there, then…?_

“No luck,” Iwaizumi yelled helplessly. Kageyama watched his senpai stare blankly for a moment longer, before suddenly hauling his arm back and punching the door. “ _Damn_ it...!”

Kageyama surveyed the intersection. _Doors?...Alleys?..._ he tensed. _There’s really nothing…_

It was then that he realized what the scene was missing. There were no shadows.

_Anything dark,_ he thought, scanning the area like a word search. Now that he knew what to look for, it was a simple matter of there or not-there –

_There._

“Iwaizumi-san!” he shouted. “Here!”

“Where?” Hope melted back into his senpai’s voice, the only warm thing left.

“The sewer!”

The two boys ran to the slot of darkness, gaping in stark contrast to the washed-out concrete. Iwaizumi hummed. “How do we…?”

“...we just have to fall in, I guess,” Kageyama said. _Although...would a broken neck really be a better way to go?_

“Not like we have any other choice,” Iwaizumi nodded. “Alright. I’ll go first.” The third-year dropped onto his stomach, backing himself in feet-first, disappearing slowly over some unseeable ledge until there were only his arms, straining with their grip on the concrete, and – he let go, vanishing altogether.

“Iwaizumi?” Kageyama called, feeling the moon’s pressure more intensely than ever, peeling insistently at his skin.

“It’s okay!” Kageyama heard his senpai’s voice faintly from the sewer. “It’s not a long drop. Go feet-first, okay? I’ll catch you.”

Kageyama flushed involuntarily. “Okay.” He lowered his feet and legs into the drainage hole until he felt hands grasp his ankles.

“You’re doing good! Just a little more!”

Kageyama held his breath, scooting himself backwards until he held himself up by his elbows. Iwaizumi gripped him right below his knees.

“Okay, on three, just like one of those trust-building exercises.” Kageyama paled – he had never done any of those right – but it was too late to worry about any of it. “One – two –”

Kageyama let himself go, bracing himself to land, and was surprised at how easily the other took hold of him, hefting him onto his feet with an indignant grunt.

“You almost kicked me!” Iwaizumi growled.

“Sorry,” Kageyama mumbled.

Iwaizumi sighed, ruffling his kouhai’s hair. “Don’t worry about it. A sewer, huh…”

“It was all I could think of,” Kageyama said defensively.

“I know. Thank God at least one of us was thinking,” he chuckled. “Although,” he added, seriousness darkening his features, “I don’t know how we’ll get out, after all this.”

“Well,” Kageyama considered. “There has to be an easier way in and out, right? For the workers.”

“Right…” Iwaizumi frowned, before snapping, a tart sound that caught Kageyama offguard. “What about those holes? In the street?”

“Manholes,” Kageyama said.

“Exactly! There are probably ladders,” he gestured, waving a hand vertically, “so we could climb out that way when the sun comes back up.”

They shared a quiet moment, neither willing to suggest their next move. The air was heavy, warm, and a little disgusting, tinged with the smell of waste and mold. Eventually, Kageyama heard Iwaizumi shift, crossing his arms.

“I hope Oikawa’s okay,” he muttered.

Kageyama couldn’t help the bitter taste that rose on the back of his tongue. He bit down the horrible _maybe I don’t_ , which he felt, but didn’t really believe. He knew that his was a lost cause, but what really bothered him, in the end, was that he still didn’t know _why._

“Kageyama?” The younger looked up brightly, hoping against his will for Iwaizumi to _prove me wrong_ , but was disappointed by the reassuring smile his senpai gave him. “We’re gonna be fine, alright? We’ll get out.”

Kageyama considered his reply. Of course they would be alright, or they had to believe so, at the very least – but things wouldn’t be the same as this morning. On the surface, things would be awkward; things would stiffen, and it would be _the way things are_ ; he would never again be able to glow in the morning, look out his window, and say, _“maybe.”_ He knew he shouldn’t think about those things right then, when they had to worry about more important things – but at the same time, _what could possibly be more important?_

Kageyama let himself grow distracted by the gentle light on his senpai’s face, until he realized – _light._

“Iwaizumi-san?” he began.

“Huh?”

“Well, it’s just that – we can see each other, right?” Kageyama asked nervously.

“Right…?” Iwaizumi’s brows drew together in confusion before it dawned on him what Kageyama meant. “Oh. I don’t know where the light could be coming from…”

Kageyama followed the angle of the cool-tinged light, tracing it to scattered points on the walls. He reached out, feeling around the patches of corroded metal, until he found a groove and delicately fished around with two fingers. Something faceted and cold to the touch rolled between his fingers; carefully, he held up the source of the light, inspecting it with fascination.

It was a tiny blue ball of glass. It had to be no bigger than the ball of his thumb, and – it was drop-shaped, Kageyama noticed, casting an oblong halo of tinted light.

“Careful...”

“I think it’s okay,” Kageyama said. “It doesn’t feel the same as the light,” he motioned, “up there. You can feel it too, right?”

“...yeah,” Iwaizumi nodded slowly. “I guess there’s something different about it. It's probably not dangerous, anyway. What do you think this is?” he added, taking the glowing trinket and rotating it thoughtfully between his thumb and forefinger.

“Dunno.”

“Where’d it come from?”

Kageyama pointed his thumb towards the wall. As Iwaizumi grunted and continued inspecting the glass drop, Kageyama reapproached the curve of the wall, frowning thoughtfully as he traced the arch with his finger, following it until he found another fist-sized groove. He felt around, noting the ribbed texture, almost like it had been woven together…

“They’re nests,” he realized.

“Nests? So these are –”

“– _eggs!”_

Iwaizumi almost dropped the blue-glass egg he was holding, scrambling to catch it in the palm of his other hand. “Shit.”

“What do you think…”

“Laid them?” Iwaizumi hummed. “They look like bird eggs. Couldn’t be bigger than a hummingbird, though…” He held up the egg against the wall, light washing over the dozens – hundreds – of nests as he searched for the empty pocket, finally replacing the tiny glass bauble where Kageyama had first found it.

“...weird…” Kageyama shivered.

“Kind of,” Iwaizumi rubbed the back of his neck. “Kinda cool, too. Well,” he started, “we should probably go on ahead and see if we can find one of those ladders. We’re near a busy part of town, so there should be some around, right?”

So they shuffled through the sewage, their paths dimly lit by the colony of nests crusted along both sides of the pipage. Kageyama thought it was strange, how the blue light washed over everything so naturally, glinting over patches of wet sand, shifting them into bottomless mirrors full of life.

He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could manage words, Iwaizumi blurted, “I owe you an answer, don’t I?”

“Uh…” Kageyama pursed his lips nervously. They both stopped at the same time.

“Listen,” Iwaizumi began again. “I understand – I – I know where you’re coming from. Gah, that’s not what I mean,” he shook his head, “what I mean to say is – I don’t think you’re weird or anything, okay?”

“Okay…”

“But,” and there was that dreaded word, “I don’t think I can reciprocate. It’s just – I wish I could, but – I’m in love with someone else,” Iwaizumi finally admitted, blushing fiercely.

“Oh,” said Kageyama. The word was, of course, entirely insufficient in conveying the caustic flush of envy that bubbled in his gut, hot and acrid like a toxic fountain. He knew, of course, exactly whom Iwaizumi meant; the thought curled into claws and he squirmed under its uncomfortable grip, gritting his teeth until he finally couldn’t hold back the –

_“Why?”_

Beneath him, Kageyama felt the ground shift, rising in little fist-sized mounds that trembled with pale blue light, swelling with all the things he couldn’t express.

“Kageyama?”

“What does he have –”

– the ground, burning with deep azure, split open –

“– that I _don’t?”_

All at once, a storm of soul-blue birds erupted, gushing out of the knolls of sand like an ocean of glass, screaming with the sounds of bells and windchimes as they streamed after Kageyama, who found himself already running.

“Kageyama!” he heard from behind him, but he refused to look back, ears burning with shame, and then his foot punched through air and kept going, and his entire body followed, and the impact that followed crushed the wind and the light out of him.

 

Everything was buzzing when he blinked dully awake moments later. The first thing he saw was a twenty foot shaft directly above him, glittering faint blue, with a dark silhouette at the top.

“I’m coming down!” Iwaizumi shouted. Kageyama, still stunned, watched him scramble down the three or four rungs that were there and drop down the rest of the way, landing nimbly and crouching beside him.

“Is anything broken? Can you feel your legs?”

“Y-yeah,” Kageyama answered shakily, drawing himself forward and struggling to his feet, then realizing what a mistake that was as his knees gave out from under him pathetically.

“Don’t be an idiot, damn it,” Iwaizumi scowled. “God, for a second I thought you were....”

“I’m fine,” Kageyama assured him quickly, guiltily averting his eyes. “Sorry.”

“Yeah, well,” Iwaizumi’s expression softened, “we’re lucky this stuff was here.”

Kageyama suddenly became aware of what he had landed on, and grabbed a handful of the pile, smooth to the touch. He saw: it was seaglass, frosted and glowing, ranging from coin-sized to little blue-green spheres like grains of sand.

It then occurred to him to look at the place he had fallen into, and he was awestruck. The ceiling stretched above like a celestial sky, with crescents of blue-gray lichen glittering like circumpolar stretches of stars. There was a faint humming buzz of bird wings, like the edges of broken bottles being rubbed together. As he sat up, more slowly this time, he saw the ground was seaglass spiked with claw-like crystals, like fingers curled around a palm, and _there_ , he noticed with widening eyes, was –

Everything stopped with an ethereal scream, deafeningly sharp and imbued, somehow, with divine authority.

It sat atop a crystalline perch in the middle of the chamber, a mass of feathers black enough to suck the light out of the air around them, each crusted with silver-blue around the edges. The beast dwarfed them with the height of two men, claws the size of their arms, and eyes – six of them – blinking, the color of beetle shells, all-seeing.

“Kami-sama,” was all Kageyama could think to say.

The feral god cackled, a sound that echoed in all hollows of the chamber, edged with the threat to shatter. “Welcome,” it bowed wryly, “to _our domain.”_

Kageyama felt his heart thundering in his throat.

“We’re sorry for the intrusion,” Iwaizumi choked, bowing deeply, clearly to the god’s amusement.

“ _‘Don’t worry about it.’_ Is that what you wanted to hear?” it laughed, a croaking sound from the chest.

“What –” Kageyama began to ask, but froze powerlessly under the god’s stare. It demanded respect – total submission.

“Er, kami-sama,” he began again, bowing to match Iwaizumi. “Please, let us go."

Another hearty cackle. “So eager to leave, already?”

“...we don’t have much of anywhere else to go,” Iwaizumi muttered to Kageyama. “Until morning, anyway.”

“Oh?” The god perused them, each eye blinking in turn. “That’s right. Tonight’s the Night of No Shadows, no? The ‘wine moon,’ they used to call it.” It preened a wing, one eye wavering over them, fluttering coyly. “Of course, one need only wear blue to be protected.”

“What's this about blue?” Iwaizumi blurted.

“Blue,” the god spread its wings, at least thirty feet in span, and stared them down with the absolute composure of a shrine effigy, “is the color of shadow. It is a blessèd color. Blue lights cast unreapable shadows. After all, we would not have that _conspicuous_ moon god infringing upon our domain,” it added with tangible disgust.

_So we could have just worn our uniforms,_ Kageyama realized, biting back a groan.

“Kami-sama,” Iwaizumi prompted.

“Spare me,” the hulking creature rolled its eyes with an irritated huff. “So you fell in, and now you want out. We don’t really care about you,” it curled its barbed tongue at Iwaizumi, “but _that_ one,” it continued, turning its gaze pointedly to Kageyama, “is more valuable. He has shadow eyes.”

Kageyama glanced to his left, seeing himself in the facets of ten crystals at once, and in each of them – dark blue eyes, blending into the background, like they too had sprouted from the hallowed ground.

“You both have similar souls,” it hummed, “so it ought not matter much if we let one of you go. Aren’t we generous? Go on, then.”

“Absolutely not,” Iwaizumi answered immediately.

The god cocked its head. _“Excuse us,”_ it hissed, a low, earthy sound that made the walls seem to sag inwards, claiming every axis as its own.

Iwaizumi kneeled, bowing more insistently. “Please excuse my impudence!" Kageyama couldn’t tell if it was deference or fear that brought him to his knees, but he mirrored the other, biting back his pride. “But I can’t leave without my companion.”

“Iwaizumi-san –”

“– shut up, Kageyama,” the older boy growled.

“...troublesome, aren't you.” Kageyama dared to look up at the bestial god and instantly regretted it, looking into its six slitted eyes and knowing that the god knew _every one of his secrets._

“I – I have a proposition,” Iwaizumi stammered, and when Kageyama glanced over he could see the tiny drops of sweat, glinting blue in the light of the chamber, budding fearfully at the nape of his neck.

“Oh?” the god encouraged wryly.

“If you – uh – kami-sama, if you gave us a task to fulfill…”

“A task?” it echoed, laughing deeply, a tri-toned sound evoking the sensation of burial, or suffocation. “You humans think you can please a _god?”_

“We don’t have any other choice,” Iwaizumi answered steadily, grimacing under the god’s ravenous grin.

“There’s nothing you can do to please us,” it stated, “apart from _writhing,_  like the filthy insects you are.”

“...then we’ll writhe.”

It was Kageyama who had spoken, although he had no idea when or how his mouth had even moved. But from the chamber-shaking cackle that followed, he figured it was a good thing, all in all.

“Very well. We’ll give you a task,” it agreed. “One that will make _that one_ squirm.”

It was referring, of course, to Kageyama.

“You will answer a question.”

Eight eyes burned into Kageyama, then, as both the god and Iwaizumi watched him expectantly; he became suddenly aware that the question would be directed at him.

“How many people,” the god queried, “do you need?”

Kageyama thought, and opened his mouth, but found his voice an unwilling messenger, catching stubbornly at the back of his tongue. _It doesn’t matter what I say,_ he knew, closing his mouth, _because it knows what I really believe...it_ wants _me to lie. So it can mock me more._

So Kageyama took a breath and tried again. “Other people are...nice, but you only need one.”

The god leaned in intently, clearly prompting him to go on, so Kageyama said what he really believed:

“You can only afford to _need_ one person. Yourself.”

He stubbornly avoided looking at Iwaizumi, unsure of whether he’d find shock or pity in his expression, or a combination of the two, and not really wanting to find out.

“Well,” the god’s expression curled maliciously, “isn’t _that_ the telling answer.

“Do something for us, boy. Pick up that piece of glass, right there. That’s right,” it coaxed crookedly. “Now, we want you to throw it at us. But! You’re going to be missing something."

Without warning, black clouded over half of Kageyama’s vision, stealing all of one eye's vision.

“We're not going to blind you,” the god snorted, reading Kageyama’s mind. “We're going to teach you. Though we're not sure it’s worth pummelling a lesson into such a painfully dense student.”

Kageyama studied the rather large target, sizing up what he thought would be a reasonable distance, and threw the seaglass with what should have been perfect aim. He was somewhat shocked when the tiny disk dropped at least ten feet short of the perch, clattering to a stop beneath the god’s feet.

_“I-di-ot,”_ the god crooned, suddenly in Kageyama’s face, so close that he could make out the individual strands of its monstrous feathers. “You can’t even tell fifty feet from ten. One eye is half-sight. One man is half-life. But what about two? Three? Or –” it laughed with bulging, erratic eyes “–  _six?_ You’d be invincible. Or...is one enough for you?”

“No,” Kageyama whispered.

“Then you tell me,” it dared. _“How many do you need?”_

_Friends,_ Kageyama thought. _Family. Lovers...but if I were to put a number on it, that I had to live by, it would be…_

“You need them all.”

It was Iwaizumi, in the end, who answered.

“Aren’t _you_ the greedy one,” the god laughed.

“It’s true,” he insisted. “We don’t get to choose. Everyone’s just as important as the next guy. You need them all, to do...whatever it is they do,” he threw his hands up, out of words.

Kageyama couldn’t hold in his incredulity. “ _All_ of them?”

“Of course.”

“Even the annoying ones?”

Iwaizumi laughed fondly. “ _Especially_ the annoying ones. One day, you’ll meet someone so _fucking_ annoying...and you’ll feel like the luckiest person in the world.”

Kageyama dropped his eyes to the ground, feeling his last shreds of hope he’d been clinging onto, melting beneath his fingertips, slipping beyond his grasp and into the ether. He didn’t understand why, or how, Iwaizumi felt the way he did, but he understood the feeling – he knew it by heart – and he understood that the life he had wanted would never spontaneously puzzle itself out.

He would have to journey on.

Kageyama was startled by the sound of a great flutter of glass, and looked up to see parallel spirals of faceted birds, locking into each other and crystallizing downwards and outwards, flattening into some semblance of a staircase.

“Now, leave,” the god ordered, “before we change our mind.”

The two didn’t wait, stumbling up the staircase and scrambling onto the sandy terrain of the familiar, stinking tunnels. Behind them, the stairs dissolved into flying shards, and the entrance, a deceivingly innocent five-by-five hole, sealed itself up like a shriveling iron flower, though Kageyama caught the haunting croak before the chamber erased itself entirely:

_“Good luck, shadow-boy.”_

 

Kageyama would have mentioned the jackets – but as they walked, he noticed a pale blue sheen glazing both of their bodies, dust that glittered at every trace of light. _A blessing,_ he figured.

“Kageyama!” Iwaizumi, walking ahead of him, was motioning excitedly under a stream of copper light.

Kageyama ran to meet him and, sure enough, Iwaizumi had found a ladder, with a tiny eye of light winking down at them from above.

The two of them scrambled up the shaky rungs, and Iwaizumi had to strain to shove the manhole open, but then, at last – they were out, filling their lungs with spring-sweet fresh air, safe under the vengeful glow of the harvest moon.

“Say, Kageyama,” Iwaizumi mumbled, roads ahead, as they made to part, “the raven had a point, you know.”

Kageyama grimaced, burning red with shame, but was surprised when Iwaizumi said something completely different from what he was expecting.

“We do have similar souls,” he continued, voice brimming with a fond warmth. “We’re both shadows. Which is why,” he added with a small, sad smile, “it would never work. With us. We'd just help each other disappear."

Kageyama nodded slowly, unable to conceal his inevitable disappointment, and was surprised with the strength of the aggressive hug he found himself wrapped up in.

“You’re gonna be fine,” Iwaizumi smiled into his shoulder. “Just – there’s someone out there, okay? Someone – bright.”

 

In the morning, Kageyama woke up – refreshed, and a little heartbroken all over again.

Yawning, he walked over to the window, looking up and glimpsing the ghost of the previous night’s half moon.

_So it was a dream_.

Of course it was. Kageyama remembered how it had really happened:

 

_“I have to tell you something!”_

_“Okay.”_

_“...I like you!...I really like you, Iwaizumi-san. I always have.”_

_“Kageyama…” Iwaizumi paused, then bowed deeply. “I’m sorry, but I can’t return your feelings.”_

_“O-oh.”_

_“I don’t think any less of you,” he added, straightening up and walking closer. He raised an arm, and Kageyama wasn’t sure what he was going to do for a moment, before he felt his senpai’s hand in his hair, familiar and comforting despite the situation._

_“You’ll be alright.”_

 

Kageyama hadn’t believed him at the time. Now, he wasn’t sure what he believed, looking out at the faint half-arc of the moon, wondering about its other half.

But maybe things were different, now. He had a new school, a new team, both better than they had ever been back in those times. Even when he was alone, he didn’t really feel that way – there were so many people out there, now, waiting for him like stars that never went out.

That morning, as the windows of the Karasuno gym cast little rectangles of sunlight across the floor, catching on Hinata’s bright orange hair and kindling it like a beacon, it occurred to Kageyama that maybe, now, he finally understood what Iwaizumi had meant.

**Author's Note:**

> A big thanks to Authoress, whose amazing work, "Build A Temple In Me," inspired the Ghibli-esque spin that I aimed for with this fic. Also, my eternal admiration to Joe Hisaishi, whose music I listened to for all the time I spent writing this piece. My Tumblr is overcurrents.tumblr.com, so you can find me there – I'm always delighted by whatever kudos and comments people are willing to leave, but my hope, first and foremost, is that you enjoyed the read! ^u^


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